May 15, 2005

Something French.

Americans have largely shunned the Segway, it seems, because you just look too damned foolish riding one. I mean, this says it all, doesn't it?

Aren't the French supposed to be -- or at least look -- more sophisticated than us? How then can you explain this? (That's one of a number of pictures from Paris, by my colleague, Nina Camic. For more, go to her blog and scroll down.)
Posted by Ann Althouse at 8:58 AM
Tags: ,

4 comments:

Be said...

Oh dear. Well, it's an improvement over purple 'yanquis' caps, the homeboy-baggy jeans and the sweatshirts with bad English printed all over them.

5/15/05, 11:45 AM
Ann Althouse said...

Stephen Aslett: Yes, good chance they are tourists, but the French are still offering these things, encouraging the tourists to be a bigger spectacle than they would otherwise be. That's not elegant and sophisticated of them.

5/15/05, 4:13 PM
tiggeril said...

They have Segway tours here in Chicago.


Unfortunately, tourists tend to not be very good at steering and they make walking along Michigan Avenue a bit of a chore.


That having been said, the mere sight provides some much-needed amusement on a weekday.

5/15/05, 5:26 PM
TigerHawk said...

A couple of weeks ago I was in the suburbs of Chicago on business and met a doctor who travels from his office to a hospital in the same huge complex via Segway. Apparently it shaved his travel time from 15 minutes to six or seven, and he had calculated the savings over the course of a year. He added that he only felt free to use the Segway because he was "already married." So the idea that a Segway is a sex-repellant is well-understood, apparently.

5/16/05, 8:43 PM

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